


Nothing lasts forever (and I will always let you down)

by TimesBeingWhatTheyAre



Series: Growing Up (and the ways it hurts) [1]
Category: How I Met Your Mother
Genre: (mostly), 5 + 1, Abuse, Angst, Aromantic Character, Barney!whump, Canon Compliant, Family, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Attempted Suicide, Some Pre-Canon, Suicidal Thoughts, Whump, tw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-29
Updated: 2020-05-29
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:33:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24432142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TimesBeingWhatTheyAre/pseuds/TimesBeingWhatTheyAre
Summary: aka Barney Stinson through the agesFour times Barney was insulted and did nothing, and the one time he did something
Relationships: Barney Stinson & James Stinson, Lily Aldrin/Marshall Eriksen, Ted Mosby & Barney Stinson
Series: Growing Up (and the ways it hurts) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1772482
Comments: 7
Kudos: 64





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Soooooo I wrote Barney angst instead of continuing my other fic, that I promised a swift update on...
> 
> Hope you enjoy :)

1.

Barney’s just a kid the first time he’s insulted. He’s sweet and naïve, and believes in what adults tell him, because adults never lie.

It’s not the other kids talking about him (the bullying doesn’t really begin until he reaches middle school and begins to grow his hair), no, the first unkind words said about him are said by a dumb boyfriend of his mother’s.

He and James are used to getting out of the way when mum brings boyfriends over. Barney had just sat around and smiled at George, the first one he can remember, and his mother had grabbed his cheek and tossed him out the room, none too gently.

He had sat outside the door and cried softly, and James had come running up to him and frowned down at him.

“What’s wrong?” he remembers James asking, his dark eyes a little concerned but mostly just quizzical. Even though James was older, he hadn’t quite learnt the emotional wisdom that only comes from experience.

“M-Mum has a boyfriend,” Barney had whimpered, and James had rolled his eyes and sat down next to Barney with a kick to his younger brother’s legs.

“We don’t go near mum’s boyfriends. Remember?” James had sighed, and then wrapped his short arms around his brother.

“O-okay,” Barney agreed sadly, shrinking into James’ warm side for a minute, then being forced to his feet as James had stood up and pointed off into the distance.

“Race you to that tree!” James crowed, and Barney forgot his tears then in the rush of joy exhilaration at chasing his brother.

It’s the third boyfriend who really causes the problem.

Barney hadn’t forgotten what James had said about mum and her boyfriends. They’d steered well clear of Dave, who only lasted a few weeks anyway, but with Dave’s absence came Peter, and Peter had stayed with mum for almost a year.

The first months had been okay, but when Barney looks back as an adult, he knows that the bruises littering James’ dark cheekbones weren’t from roughhousing with other kids, as mum had said. Peter had never been a good boyfriend to his mum, and never a good person to her kids.

“What’s up with the scrawny one?” Peter says one night, as Barney sits down under the kitchen counter, blocked from sight and practically forgotten in the wake of his mother’s anger after he had accidentally knocked dinner onto the floor.

“He’s just a little dreamy,” his mum defends (and it’s the nicest thing she ever says about him).

“He’s an idiot. Better off with punishment than your coddling. He’ll never get anywhere,” Peter sneers, and Barney bites his lip to stop it trembling.

He’s not an idiot!

“…be gentle with him,” Loretta says finally, and its later that night that Peter comes to Barney’s room drunk and sits him down for a ‘talk’, and ends up giving him a blackeye.

He cries alone in his room that night, and James doesn’t come save him.

Peter makes Barney feel scared, and he hates it. Hates him.

He never quite forgives his mum for dating him, even after she kicks him out the house.

* * *

2.

The second time that Barney is really hurt by an insult is really high school.

James isn’t really around that much; too busy at his sports clubs where he is the star of every single one and beloved by most of the school. Barney, in contrast, is the odd one out, and everyone knows that too.

His hair is shoulder length by then, and Barney wears it down proudly, inserting the odd flower in it and wearing the loosest flowing outfits he can get away with. He never quite dares to wear a dress or a skirt to school, but they hate him anyway.

He’s caught alone in the bathroom after school, cheerfully changing into his slightly dirtier clothing to go volunteer at the homeless shelter, and there’s five of them. There’s no way he could get away, and Barney is morally against fighting.

“Hey guys,” he says, turning around slowly to face them with a nervous grin. “There’s no need to fight. I’ll just be on my way, okay?”

“That’s funny,” the tallest of them laughs, and Barney tries not to meet his narrowed gaze. “See, we thought it was about time we taught you a lesson that even a girl like you could accept,”

Barney laughs along with them quietly, hands still held up in the air, and he drops his nicer clothing carefully onto the ground and steps forwards.

“It’s okay. We are all a part of nature, and so as your brother, I would be more than happy to help you-“

They leave him lying in the bathroom, nose bruised (if not broken), and his clothing torn to rags. He wishes uselessly for James, but it’s the school caretaker who finds him and patches him up.

Barney tries to find it in himself to be thankful that they at least left his hair alone, but its tinged with red blood for a month before he is finally able to wash it out.

He does tell James. James gives him a manly, one-armed hug, and tries to teach him how to throw a punch, but teenage Barney will never bring himself to fight. He does appreciate the attempt, but ultimately it cements what Barney knows to be true.

James doesn’t know him anymore.

He is alone.

* * *

3.

…Until he meets Shannon.

Shannon is beautiful, natural in a way that Barney wishes he could be, and he does everything she asks of him. It’s their dream to join the Peace Corps, and he spends weeks imagining the joy of bringing joy to others, alongside the girl who he thinks is the love of his life.

He dosen’t take Greg’s insults to heart the first time he hears them. The second time he sees Greg, kissing his girl, Barney is too angry to be offended by what he says.

It’s Shannon who breaks his heart.

He knows then and there that he can’t join the Peace Corp. He can’t show his heart on his sleeve. It only will lead to him getting hurt.

He resolves never to let himself be affected by another girl again, and goes to James (like he always does). James is comforting in his own way, and as is Rhonda, but all it really manages to do is give Barney a level of defence that he perfects over the course of the next decade. He becomes seamless, modelled off Greg and Peter and every asshole boyfriend his mum ever had, because they weren’t hurt by rejection and neither is evolved Barney.

It’s lonely though.

* * *

4.

After James comes out as gay, Barney finds himself embroiled a little in the gay community, and yes its mostly to help his brother at first, but after a while, he finds some terms that he realises actually apply to him.

It’s a bit of a shock. He didn’t really think there was a name for it, but he’s happier than he will admit to discover it’s not just him being broken after the things he’s gone through.

He thinks it’s a bit awkward anyway, so he only tells James at first. James is overjoyed for him as well, and they celebrate by going out and perfecting their wingman act for one another.

It takes him quite a few years to feel comfortable enough with Ted and the gang to bring it up.

They are all sitting around Marshall, Lily and Ted’s apartment, the tv on inanely and board games set up, and Barney is having little luck persuading anyone to come down to the bar with him.

“It’ll be fun guys! Think of all the girls…and guys…” he says with a wink to the two ladies, and Robin rolls her eyes.

“Just because you’re afraid of emotional attachment doesn’t mean the rest of us just want one-night stands,” she mocks, and Barney feels a little hurt, but makes a bit scene out of it, gasping theatrically.

Robin has _no leg_ to stand on here. She’s almost as bad as he is, and Barney has a reason.

He opens his mouth to cry hypocrite, but Ted throws in before he can.

“Yeah, perhaps you’d be less annoying if you had a steady girlfriend,” he smirks, and Marshall flings a comment back.

“Nah, Barney can’t handle emotions long enough for a girlfriend,” the man snickers, and Barney frowns.

“He’s a bit like a well-oiled robot, isn’t he,” Robin grins to a ripple of laughter.

Barney scowls for real now, and wonders-

“Guys, could you not?” he says quietly, and Lily turns to him immediately, sensing the discomfort under his voice.

“Why?” Lily questions immediately, and he gives her a slightly hesitant smile.

“Well- I’m actually aromantic,” he says, forcing the words out even though they fall to pieces in his mouth, and he tentatively looks around for a reaction to see mostly confused faces.

“That means I don’t want relationships,” he supplies with a sigh, and it’s Marshall’s turn to frown.

“Like- ever?” he asks, and Barney shakes his head a little. “But- how? What’s the point of life without someone like Lily?”

Barney winces slightly at the question, choosing to ignore the idea that his life is only worth living if he wants romance, and presses on. “I just- don’t. Like someone who dislikes sweets or something. It’s just something I don’t want,”

Robin snorts. “You can’t excuse yourself being bad with women,” she says.

“I’m great with women. I just don’t want to have a relationship with them,” he replies, getting a bit insulted at the questions.

“Okay Barney,” she says, clearly humouring him, and he rolls his eyes at her.

Ted sits quietly on the couch, considering the concept, and then he shrugs. “Okay,” he says simply, and Barney feels a wave of relief that at least some of his friends accept him.

The conversation moves on and he tries to join in, putting Robin’s reaction out of his mind as best he can. He pretends like he doesn’t even care that Lily and Marshall didn’t actually say what they felt about it, and shelves the conversation deep in his brain, perhaps to be brought out again if the time was right.

It ends up being a long time until that day comes.


	2. Chapter 2

5.

In the end, it’s his supposed friends who hurt him the most. They insult him constantly, and yes he acts annoying and whiny and drags them all over the place but-

He’s never managed to have one group of friends this long. Barney knows, deep down, that he’s terrified that they will leave him, and he knows that gradually they are pulling away from him.

All things change in their group, from couples and fights and apartments, but Barney is very good at latching on to something and not letting go, no matter how much it hurts. He tries as hard as he can to constantly dissuade his friends from marriage and couples and takes girls home with him every night and pretends like nothing they say or do can ever hurt him.

And they insult him, constantly.

He knows to them its friendly banter, and he attacks them right back with a beaming grin and dramatic acting, but he holds on to every word and whispers it to himself when he’s alone (so he makes sure that he never is alone).

One of his worst memories with his friends becomes the slap bet, because it has the side effect of making him terrified of Marshall. He’s sure the man never notices, but Barney tries his hardest to never be alone in a room with him afterwards, and mostly succeeds, but there’s no shaking the feeling of being the outsider.

They all laugh and cheer when he gets hurt. They all laugh at him, and Barney can’t stand it.

Worse still, all of them are getting older. They spend less time together in the bars, instead spending time on more mature activities that can’t chase the demons from Barney’s brain in the same way that alcohol and a frenetic chase of girls can. He wonders once if he could get into racing, but he’s scared too of the power he holds behind a wheel and how easy it would be to hurt somebody else.

Or himself.

He tries to hold on anyway, and it’s a perfectly ordinary evening when Ted says “Just leave then, if you don’t want to be here. We don’t want you here anyway,” and Barney-

Well, he usually retorts with a snappy “you don’t deserve the honour of my presence” and storms out, off to a bar, but he just can’t muster up the will all of a sudden.

“Right,” he mumbles, backing up. “Well then.”

Lily and Robin are in the kitchen, Lily cooking and Robin drinking, and Lily is the only one who really notices if something is up, so nobody stops Barney when he opens the door and leaves.

He tosses back two shots in the bar, intending to get very drunk, but a girl hits on him and Barney can’t stand being in the bar any longer.

He doesn’t stay long enough to pay for his drinks, knowing Carl will put it on his tab anyway, and staggers out of the door, hailing a taxi to take him back to his flat. His head spins from the alcohol and he’s actually rather happy to focus on that instead of the whirlwind of emotions that he’s been trying hard to drown, and Barney’s overjoyed to arrive home to drink up the nice scotch and cheap beer.

He tosses the cab driver some money, and trips upstairs, intending to grab a beer when he enters through his front door, but instead all he can hear is Ted saying “We don’t want you here anyway,” and the way it sears into his heart like a truth he’s always known and refuses to acknowledge.

The truth is that nobody wants him.

In his more sober moments, he wonders whether he was born unlovable, but this is far from a sober moment. He slams the door closed behind him, and topples to the floor because his legs don’t want to work properly anymore. He chokes out a hysterical laugh in the silence of his apartment, the sound echoing around the walls of his empty life, and buries his head in his hands as the tears begin to fall.

Barney knows distantly that this is what having a mental breakdown is a lot like, and promptly stuffs that information far away in favour of whacking his head with his closed fist as though he can knock the knowledge of his unwantedness out of it.

It doesn’t work.

He chokes down another sob, the noise coming out loud anyway, and tries to think about the nice moments with his friends and the parts of life he enjoys most. He thinks of James, and the last time he’d come to visit, and his wedding almost a year on.

Oh yeah, James was married now. James no longer belonged to him. James was gone.

He thinks about Lily and her kind eyes, but also the mocking humour the day that she’d let Marshall slap him, thinking for a moment about being Marshall’s best man (but that had been begrudged and unwanted).

He thinks about Robin with her sharp humour, and Ted who followed him out to bars and on crazy adventures, and all that filled his mind was the way Robin had reacted to the news that he was aro and Ted’s voice echoing in his ears again.

“We don’t want you here anyway,”

Barney cries out lowly, pain wrenching through his gut again at the thought that the people who he counted as friends couldn’t understand him and didn’t accept him and didn’t want him. He collapses onto his side, grabbing on to his ribs tightly as though to stop himself from breaking apart, and that’s when he has a sudden thought.

The top drawer.

It startles him enough to let him sit up properly, and Barney wonders dimly if the solution really is that easy. He stumbles back to his feet and rushes across the room, angrily swiping the tears away from his eyes to clear his vision enough to grab the hand pistol he keeps in the drawer of the cabinet.

He thanks his past self briefly for not locking it up. Maybe this is the way it’s meant to be.

His shaking hands reach the unloaded bullets easily enough, although it’s a bit of a task to slot them in correctly, and he only bothers spending the time putting one in. His hand is shaking, but he’s a good shot and shouldn’t need more than one, especially not from this close.

Barney closes his eyes tightly and wonders if he should do this.

He can’t think of anything to live for.

His finger tightens on the trigger, and suddenly all Barney can think about is his nephew, and that if he goes through with it, that baby will never get to know his uncle. Barney wants to be around for that baby, and he thinks of the look on James’ face (married or not) at his funeral and Barney throws the gun down like it disgusts him.

The tears begin anew, and he collapses to the floor in a wrinkled heap, looking desperately through his pockets for his phone.

He presses a number on it, and waits with quiet sobs as it rings.

“Hello?”

“James? I- I almost did something stupid,” he says, and begins to cry in earnest.

They talk on the phone for hours, and Barney wants nothing more than his brother’s warm arms around him, but he’s at the other end of the phone and far away. He is persuaded to put the gun in his safe though, and sets the combination to his nephew’s birthdate so he can’t open it without thinking of Eli. James promises to come over on the next flight to spend a few days with Barney, and Barney eventually falls asleep with James on the other end of the line, refusing to hang up until his younger brother is well and truly asleep.

When James arrives the next morning, he rushes immediately to Barney’s flat, not even stopping for the groceries they will certainly need. Instead, he orders them online whilst in the cab over, along with a proper breakfast, and unlocks the front door with a sigh of relief at owning a spare key.

“Barney?” he says quietly, entering the flat and crinkling his nose at the strong smell of alcohol permeating through the apartment. The front room is a bit of a mess, with drawers askew and a wrinkled jacket lying abandoned on the floor, but Barney’s not in sight, so James walks a little further in.

His brother had terrified him the night before. He had come so close to losing Barney, and James was a little in shock at the horrifying image of Barney, standing alone in this empty apartment, with a gun to his head.

How had it only been the thought of his nephew that stopped him? What was the full story of what had happened to the friends that he’d seen Barney so happy with?

“Barney?” he calls out again, a little louder, and finally spots his brother lying underneath a pile of cushions on the stylish sofa.

“James….you came,” Barney breathes out tiredly, and James can’t stop himself from rushing over and pulling his brother into a tight hug, squeezing his eyes closed in relief.

Barney trembles there for a moment, and returns the hug with just as much desperation. They stand there for a minute, then break away and pretend like neither one is wiping their eyes, and James knows just how scared Barney had been of himself the night before.

“Coffee?” he says lightly, and they both smile.

It takes two days for Ted to notice Barney’s absence.

Well, it would take him longer, but Lily asks where he is, and Ted realises that it’s been two days since he last saw Barney and then wonders if he should worry.

He dismisses the thought, and thinks instead that it’s nice to have a bit of time to himself, without Barney’s hare-brained schemes to get women distracting him. Lily seems a little less certain, but then again it’s hardly the first time that Barney’s gone travelling to Australia to find a girl, so there’s no worrying.

What is a little more worrying is that Robin walks in at the end of the third day and says “I think I just saw James in town? Buying groceries?”

“James….James…. an ex?” Ted tries to think, and receives an eyeroll for his trouble.

“James, Barney’s brown gay brother who is not adopted,” Robin elaborates, and Ted has a moment of sharp recollection.

“Oh! That James! Why’s it odd?” he queries.

“Well, he doesn’t live here. So he’s here visiting Barney, but usually when that happens, Barney shows him off to us, but,” she gestures around the Barney-less apartment. “No Barney.”

Lily pops her head back in from the kitchen, then hurriedly pretends she wasn’t eating the peanut butter. “Think we should check on him?”

Ted raises an eyebrow. “That’s probably exactly what he wants, the drama queen,”

“Maybe we should,” Robin muses, and Ted is fairly sure she’s saying it to annoy him, but he gets overruled, and Marshall obviously sides with Lily.

So that’s how they end up outside Barney’s apartment.

Lily reaches her hand up firmly and knocks on the door, then scuttles behind Marshall when movement sounds behind it, so it’s Ted who’s at the front when it opens to reveal James, Barney’s brother.

“Hey, we were wondering if Barney was around?” Ted tries, and receives a truly scathing glare from James.

“No,” he says blankly, and goes to close the door.

“That’s rude,” Lily comments, and squeaks when James turns the death glare on her .

“He’s not here,” James repeats instead of properly replying, and makes to close the door again, only a figure walks up behind him.

“Is that the pizza- oh,” Barney says, very much in the apartment, and Ted rolls his eyes, turning to his friends.

“See, he’s fine,” he tells them, and Robin nods, but Lily is frowning at Barney (or more specifically, frowning at the dark circles lingering under Barney’s eyes and the exhaustion that’s somehow sunk into his features over the three days they haven’t seen him for).

“Are you okay Barney?” Lily asks softly, and Barney startles a little, pasting a weak smile onto his face as he replies.

“Never better,”

The façade doesn’t last long though, and the smile crumbles as quickly as it appeared as Barney blinks, and ambles away again with a wave over his shoulder.

Lily looks up at James, looking his squarely in the face for the first time in their encounter, and says “We are coming in.”

James doesn’t bother to reply, standing back instead and walking to the centre of the room, grabbing a teacup and angrily pouring some tea into it. The small group walk into the room too, heading for the couches, and Ted actually looks at Barney for once.

Barney sits on the couch, looking oddly young in a hoodie and tracksuit bottoms, and the vague direction of his gaze isn’t making him seem any more alert. Ted is alarmed for a moment, and thinks for the first time that maybe everything isn’t okay.

They settle down awkwardly on the other small couch, James sitting next to Barney and handing him the cup of tea, which Barney takes without his usual grumble about it not being alcohol.

Ted wonders what to say. Luckily, Lily steps in for him.

“Is he ill?” Lily asks, the spokesperson of the collective caring in the group, and James rolls his eyes.

“Yes,” he bites out, glancing at Barney, who doesn’t look back.

“What did he catch?” she asks more specifically, and James doesn’t respond.

“You could be a bit nicer to my wife, you know,” Marshall says, getting angry at James’ non-answer to Lily, and James balls up his fists at his sides as though restraining himself from punching Marshall.

Ted gives his posture a look, then chimes in “You don’t want a fight. We just want to know what’s wrong with our friend,”

“Ha, friend, that’s rich,” James laughs, the sound nasty and harsh.

Lily frowns. “What do you mean?”

“Don’t,” Barney speaks up suddenly, his eyes fixed on James, and it looks almost like the two are communicating something that the rest of them don’t understand.

“Leave,” James says abruptly, eyes still fixed on Barney’s as the former stands up slowly and finally breaks eye contact.

“What?” Ted blurts out, and James motions them all out.

“Barney doesn’t want you here. So go,” he bites off, and Ted casts a look at Barney, who does indeed look like he doesn’t want them sticking around, and decides to stand up and spare the rest of them the trouble of arguing.

“Guys, we aren’t wanted here,” he tells them, receiving a furious look from Lily, but Robin stands up too and begins to walk towards the door. James hurries over too, opening the door for the small group, and stands there impatiently as they walk through, even Marshall and Lily reluctantly following.

James is about to close the door when Lily jams her foot in it.

“Wait!” she says, then leans in to speak more softly. “What’s wrong with him? Can we help?”

For the first time that day James’ gaze seems to gentle, and he finally gives them a bit of an answer. “Just- don’t be so hard on him. He’s not as tough as he pretends,” he says cryptically, and then closes the door in their faces.

Marshall looks confused, and Lily does too, but there’s a horrifying thought dawning in Ted’s mind and he doesn’t want to consider it, but James really made it seem as though Barney wasn’t going through something physical but something emotional and-

Ted vows then and there to pay more attention to Barney, and to pay more attention to what he says to his friend. He thought that their friendship was just antagonistic like that, but if what he’s thinking is true then Barney had a different interpretation of his words.

He turns to look at Robin, their most perceptive friend, and she’s also looking a little pale. He nods at her slightly, and knows that they are thinking the same thing.

Maybe it’s time to stop insulting Barney, and start thinking of him as human a little more.

After all, he fully intends Barney to be an uncle to his kids.

He’s glad it’s not too late to show Barney that.


End file.
